Chip shots: The future is now

Early last Saturday morning, as I was driving into my day job doing the news on WGY (810AM/103.1FM), the update said American “Mo Martin” was leading the Ricoh Women’s British Open. It’s a good thing it was 4:00 a.m. because I might have hit someone as I reacted.

“Mo Martin? I know her,” I said out loud to no one but the impending sunrise. I remember her story very well. While covering the Futures Tour for the past several years, I’ve met a lot of “up-and-comers” but her story stuck. Back in 2008, I was looking for a local angle and found some people wearing “Go Mo” buttons who asked me where Mo might be on the course. They were from Vermont and had come to cheer her on.

Vermont was close enough for me so she became one of my feature stories. Little did I know that I would meet most of her family over the next few years, including her beloved grandfather Lincoln Martin, who wore a cowboy hat and a smile we want our grandfather to have. Each year she would come back, we would chat about her season and about Lincoln. He had a ranch in California, taught himself how to play golf from a Sam Snead book, was successful in business and would travel to watch her play as often as he could. This spring, at 102, Lincoln died.

Lincoln had lived long enough to see Mo graduate from the Futures to the LPGA and I bet he had something to do with that wonderful “almost albatross” that became a one stroke leading eagle at Royal Birkdale on Sunday.

“The wind was hard downwind and left-to-right and it complimented the lie,” she said this week in a conference call. “So I knew I needed to play a little bit of a draw to hold it up and get it running up the green where I needed it to.”

Mo picked a good target: “The rest was history and I was thrilled that it hit the stick and ended up as close as it did. I hit it as best as I could.”

The club will not be in a museum, by the way.

“It’s in my bag,” she said. “It’s going to stay there…it’s definitely going to go down in history but it’s not going to come out of my bag anytime soon.” Mo bought it a Royal Birkdale headcover: “I thought that might be a fun reminder.”

Since the beginning of the year, her main sponsor has been CME Group, and a few months into the season, she got a deal with Trader Joe’s. With that deal, every birdie she and four others make, $75 goes to a food bank in Florida.

By the way, Mo (aka Melissa) got her nickname from her father, which he got from the WWII Battleship the USS Missouri.

“My dad said I never quit when I was younger, and that was known as the Battleship that never sank,” she told me once. “That was pretty influential there.” By the way, Mo once beat Lorena Ochoa. It was in Japan. Martin was 8, Ochoa was 10.

“Lorena was dominating already,” Martin said. Martin had gotten into the tournament as an alternate and won.

So maybe next week, if you head out to SEFCU Championship at Capital Hills, you’ll find a player that you can say “I knew her when.” Maybe that will be Jackie Stoelting. Earlier this year, I told you about her win on “Big Break.” Her parents grew up in the Capital Region and her dad Ed will be on her bag. She said she watched the Women’s British Open and it gives her “Mo-tivation.”

“I think she was on the Symetra Tour for six years and this is my fifth year,” said Stoelting. “I think it’s a true testament to never giving up on what you dream for.”

Stoelting currently sits sixth on the money list as she tries to realize her LPGA dreams. Also earning sponsor exemptions into the 144-player field are Ashlan Ramsey and Alexandra Buelow. Ramsey was the top-ranked amateur in the world when she left Clemson this year, according to Golfweek.

BACK-TO-BACK: On Saturday, July 12, Mike Brunell aced #4 at Shaker Ridge CC with his 9-iron from 125-yards. As his group walked off the green, Josh Spinner holed out a pitching wedge on the same hole.

SHOOTOUT: Jay Singh (Van Patten) and Adam Boghosian (Shaker Ridge CC) got in on the number (72) in the qualifying field of 26 teams and won in a chipoff on 18 at the 21st Eagle Crest Shootout on Friday, July 11. They beat Joe Quillinan and Steve Quillinan Jr.

DEADLINE: July 24 to sign up for the Newspaper in Education Junior Golf Championship at Schenectady Municipal Golf Course, Aug. 1. Entry: $35, lunch and prizes. 8:00 a.m. Competition divided into three divisions: boys’ 12-14 and 15-18 and girls’ 12-18.